


Queen Camille

by KidA_666



Series: Desires and Dreams and Powers [1]
Category: Kendare Blake, Three Dark Crowns
Genre: Canon Divergent, F/F, F/M, Multi, Prequel, Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-14
Updated: 2017-05-24
Packaged: 2018-10-18 21:29:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10625487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KidA_666/pseuds/KidA_666
Summary: The story of the queens' mother and predecessor, Camille, is largely veiled in mystery.  One daughter aspires to be her, and the other two wish to topple the dynasty of which she was a part.  It is easy to forget that their mother was just a girl when she took her crown, as they all are, with her own desires and a beating heart.





	1. Beltane

Lillian’s familiar is a great, slobbering black dog.  There had been whispers that it was half-wolf, something as grand as Queen Bernadine’s beast; but now, even in the flickering torchlight of the Disembarking, Natalia can see that it is only a mutt.  Still, it dwarfs the Naturalist, stiff as she is in her plain dress.  Melisende is further down, her torches burning the brightest, flaring up with every suitor that comes ashore.  Natalia and Genevieve exchange a glance, their eyes rolling in unison.  Showy Elementals.

Their queen stands in the center, straight-backed and wickedly beautiful.  The bodice of her gown shimmers in the torchlight, encrusted as it is with jet and black diamond.  A cobra is draped across her shoulders, drugged by the servants not an hour before.  Her dark eyes are wide, but she does not look afraid.  

Natalia grins, and Genevieve seems almost ready to clap.  Little Christophe is fidgeting excitedly, practically dancing in place.  Beside him, Antonin is beaming. Even their mother looks pleased.

The Naturalist, no matter how fierce her dog seemed, could never hope to compare; and the Elemental’s presentation was weaker still.

Of all the sisters, Camille is the jewel, polished to shining by years of poisoner training and pulsing with the energy of her Gift.  Aileen Arron had seen to that, with her daughters as her enforcers.  Cruel Genevieve, upbraiding the queen at every opportunity, shrieking that she must stand  _ straighter _ , if she hopes to face the entire island at Innisfuil and not be laughed off of the stage; and then Natalia to come behind, so that she might scold Genevieve and ease the queen’s mind in the way that only she could.

Atop the dais, Queen Camille’s gaze roves across the crowd, never pausing to stare in one place for too long.  The islanders and delegations gathered below will think that she is eager to take it all in, feasting her eyes upon the array of potential king-consorts; but it is truly one pair of eyes that she is searching for, hoping to meet.  Ice-blue eyes that go soft only for her.  

She knows that it is futile to look for Natalia when the entire island is writhing on the beach below, nearly all of them dressed in black; but she searches anyhow, because it gives her something to do until the drums cease and set her free.  Free to run to her foster family and be showered with praise, to remove the heavy snake from her shoulders.  Free to retreat to the tent with Natalia as the others lost themselves in the celebratory feast, to steal one more night before the Ascension Year begins in earnest.

Natalia is one of the first to rush up from the beach, moving nearly as fast as the cavalcade of priestesses that was meant to guide the queens back to their tents.  She catches sight of Camille’s dark head and shimmering dress just as the queen is being swallowed up by a sea of white cloaks.  Cursing, she scurries to keep up.  It is unbecoming behavior for any Arron, and especially Aileen’s heir, but Natalia does not care.  Daft as they are, she hardly trusts the Temple slaves to return the queen to her tent without trampling her underfoot.  

“Make way,” she hisses a dozen times over, pushing past the priestess’s sharp elbows and ignoring their shrill protests.  

As soon as Natalia is close enough to be heard, she shouts for the queen.  Camille turns at the sound of her voice, her girlish face lit by a different smile than the one she had given the suitors.  A smile that says too much, Natalia thinks before pushing the idea away.  Tonight, Camille can be as silly and obvious as she wants, for they have already won.

Hours later, when they are reclining in the queen’s tent and tearing idly at the untainted meat of the feast, Camille is still buzzing from victory.  She kisses Natalia a dozen times, forgetting herself and the shadows of Poisoners that move just outside of the canvas wall.  

“You will give us away,” Natalia chides after a while, even though she is still beaming with pride and something else that she will not name.  “We are the only ones to have disappeared this early.”    

“Soon enough, they will all be disappearing,” Camille purrs, “into tents and under trees.  They will hardly have time to worry about us.”

It was true.  When Natalia last saw her sister, Genevieve had been batting her pretty lashes at a dark-haired boy from across their camp.  Even serious Antonin might take a girl tonight--or a boy, Natalia thinks.  At Beltane, when the wine flows and the bonfires burn hot, it does not matter either way.

Relenting, she allows Camille’s head to sink into her lap, her black hair hanging in thick waves where the intricate braids had been removed from it by Natalia’s own deft fingers.  She touches a strand in spite of herself, gently tugging and twisting.  Camille hums happily.

“The Queens of Old always had lovers,” she whispers.  Natalia only quirks an eyebrow in response, knowing that she cannot stop the queen from reciting some piece of ancient history, memorized from a dust-covered book in the Arron library.  “Bernadine had her wild Naturalist man.  And they say that Queen Colette had thousands--women and men.”

She pauses here, her head tilting upwards to glance at Natalia.  “The histories say that she was so powerful, they simply could not resist her.”

Natalia sighs.  “And what will the histories say about us?” she asks, just to hear Camille spin some pretty tale that neither of them will truly believe.  Natalia already knows what the histories will say, written as they are by priestesses filled to their brims with Temple bias.  They will say that she was an evil succubus, and Camille an adulteress with no respect for the sacred traditions of the Goddess.  They will say that they were wicked, and every failed crop and famine on the island during Camille’s reign will be on Natalia’s head.  

 They will be wrong, Natalia thinks, and hates herself for it.  Tonight, her heart is so full that it is nearly as girlish as Camille’s.  She is halfway to making a declaration that she will regret, come morning.  The wine might be to blame, if Natalia had wet her lips with more than a sip of it.  

Camille smiles, black eyes sparkling.  It does something to Natalia that wine never will.  

“The histories will say that you made me strong, Nat.  That I was better off for having known you,” the queen says.  Natalia cannot even bring herself to scold her for the use of that childish nickname.  On any other night it would be grating; but tonight, it makes her soft.

Camille is still mumbling her make-believe histories when she falls asleep in Natalia’s lap, her pretty lips parted around an unfinished sentence.  Outside, the revelry has died down.  Only the lovers will still be awake, hidden away and stealing drunken kisses.  Tomorrow is the Quickening, and then the celebrations will be over for good.  Two queens will not return to next year’s Beltane.

Natalia looks at Camille as she has a hundred times, memorizing her features.  Admiring how even in sleep, she is beautiful.  Her fingers dance across the queen’s bluish eyelids, coming to rest on her high forehead.  It is hard to believe that the girl who calls her Nat and kisses her so feverishly will be able to kill her sisters, but she must.  Natalia will not let her become a forgotten queen, one on the long list of names belonging to those who died in their Ascension Years.  She will not see Camille’s head and arms torn from her body and tossed into the Breccia Domain like rubbish.

Natalia will not let Camille die, even if she has to kill the other queens herself.  

 

Genevieve wakes them the next day, her shrill voice made shriller by a biting hangover.  

“The Quickening Ceremony is fast approaching, Natalia.  As is Mother,” she growls, so that Natalia will push Camille away and make herself presentable.  Genevieve smiles coldly at the stirring queen, who is still batting her eyes against the sun.

Natalia glares at her.  She would not dare to tell their mother, on a day like this or any other.  Genevieve has known for years, and had already named her price: A seat on the Black Council and permanent housing at Greavesdrake.  It was as good as done the moment she requested it, so that she might keep her mouth clapped firmly shut; but still, she relished having such a secret to hold over her elder sister’s head.

Aileen Arron sweeps into the room a moment later, dressed in an uncharacteristically plain black woolen dress, with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows.  Her face betrays nothing, but Natalia knows immediately that her mother is angry.  She has been working all morning to prepare the food for that night’s  _ Gave Noir _ , with no help from either of her daughters.  Both of the younger Arrons scurry after her without a word, and Camille follows Natalia like a duckling.  

 They spend the rest of the afternoon plucking pheasants and preparing poisoned stew.  Camille steals a belladonna berry while Aileen’s back is turned, the purple juice staining her chin and fingers.  Natalia laughs as Genevieve observes them, scowling.  

When the sun begins to dip behind the hills, Camille is hurried away by a handmaiden to be dressed for the  _ Gave _ .  Aileen leaves as well, off to set the stage and present the food to a brave priestess for testing.  Genevieve and Natalia are left to tend to the mess of feathers and innards.

“It is pathetic how soft you are for her,” Genevieve says, her voice low and carefully restrained.  She does not even look up from her place on the floor, kneeling to gather pheasant bones.  “And almost sad, considering the fact that she is doomed.  The Naturalist’s dog is going to rip her heart from her ribcage.”

Natalia is so stunned that for a moment, she cannot react.  She blinks before extending one hand to slap her sister, hard.  

Tears well in Genevieve’s pretty purple eyes, but she is not deterred.  “She can glut herself on poison well enough, but can she administer it?  Has she mastered sleight of hand, as Sylvia did?  Or will she use poison arrows, like her mother?  Because I have not seen her do either, Sister.”

“You have no idea what she is capable of,” Natalia says, and her voice is a growl.  She cannot believe that Genevieve would dare to question her, let alone the queen-- _ their _ queen, she wants to scream.  The one that they were supposed to stand behind, just as the Naturalists did for Lillian and her beastly mutt.

“I am certain that I do not know as well as you,” Genevieve hisses, ducking away before Natalia can strike her again, “but I have heard what her sisters can do.  Camille is the prettiest, and she appears strong; but the Naturalist’s dog is what matters.  It would tear Camille apart without Lillian so much as uttering a word.

“And I know you say that Melisende is raving mad, as they all do.  But being mad does not mean that she is weak, Natalia.  She is said to have fits of temper so powerful that the earth shakes beneath her.”

Natalia’s chest is heaving with rage.  “What exactly do you think that the Elemental brat is going to do?  Cause an earthquake that destroys all of Indrid Down?  Bury Greavesedrake beneath a pile of rocks?”  

The look of defiant certainty in Genevieve’s eyes flickers briefly, and Natalia continues.  “As for the dog, it could be dispatched with a poisoned hambone.  Do not act as if it is some great threat, Genevieve, like Bernadine’s wolf.  Do not act as if Poisoner queens have not ruled this island for nearly a century.  Surely even you cannot be such a fool as to forget that.”

At last, Genevieve’s resolve crumbles.  Natalia has reduced her sister to tears, but she does not care.  Let her weep, surrounded by gutted birds and bloodied knives.  

Before she goes, Natalia spins on her heel to deliver one last blow.  “You are an Arron and a Poisoner, Genevieve.  Conduct yourself accordingly, or take your bedroll and join the Naturalists in their filthy tents.”  

 

From her position behind the  _ Gave  _ stage, Natalia does not see Genevieve, although their brothers are standing at the head of the crowd, staring hungrily at the covered dishes of tainted delicacies.  If her sister had any dignity left, she would not dare to show her face.  

Camille is slated to perform after Lillian but before Melisende, and Aileen has set the stage so that the queen could eat for hours, if she chose to.  By the time she is finished, the islanders will be so entranced by the girl that cannot die that they will hardly be able to focus on Melisende’s parlor tricks.  

The naturalist’s display is more gruesome than anyone had expected.  In the past, naturalist queens had always made a show of blooming wildflowers and having their familiar roll over.  But Lillian mounts the stage with a caged hare in one hand, a chain gripped tightly in the other, restraining her monstrous dog.  The crowd is craning their necks, morbidly curious.  Only the most loyal poisoners refuse to push closer to the other queen’s stage.

“Dacia,” Lillian says, more for the benefit of the audience than as an actual command, “are you hungry?”

Natalia’s ears prick.  She recognizes those words--they are sacred, to the poisoners.  To the  _ Gave  _ that their queen is about to perform.  Beside her, Camille shifts uncomfortably.  

As soon as the cage door is opened, the hare darts into the crowd, running for its life.  At the same time, Lillian releases the dog’s chain.  “Bring me the heart!” she cries, and the crowd screams out of a heady mixture of delight and fear.  

Moments later, Dacia returns with the hare in her jaws, its heart already half-separated from the crushed ribcage.  Once its little body has thudded onto the stage, the beast finishes her task and drops the heart at Queen Lillian’s feet.  The islanders roar as Natalia’s nose wrinkles in disgust.

“They truly are savages,” she whispers, squeezing Camille’s shoulder.  “Just for that, we will give her our worst poison, when the time comes.”

Camille returns her smile, but the confidence that she had been exuding since the Disembarking seems to falter.

As she watches Aileen and Camille take the stage, Natalia’s heart is in her throat.  Lillian and Dacia are on the platform to her left, and the dog’s muzzle is slick with blood.  Natalia cannot shake the idea of its jaws clamping down on her queen’s ribs, following its master’s command-- _ bring me the heart _ .  

Her mother rattles off the names of dishes.  There is a stew of russulas and skullcaps; candied black widow spiders; and at the head of the table, a purple-black pie of belladonna berries that Camille eyes like a delighted child.  The wine has been stained with pink mistletoe berries and garnished with wolfsbane.  

Natalia sighs in relief that nothing is envenomed; once, poison training with a black mamba had left Camille bedridden and hallucinating.  Aileen and Genevieve would have tried again, if Natalia had not dashed the glass vial of poison against the wall.  They would have pushed the queen until they damaged her irreparably, not understanding that even the strongest Gift has its limits.  

Genevieve, of course, had thrown a fit.  Called her sister sentimental and said that the queen was weak, all while stamping her feet like a child.  She is so prone to choler that she would be better suited as an Elemental.  

But in spite of Genevieve’s doubts, Camille’s  _ Gave  _ is a spectacular success, although it is hardly as theatrical as Lillian’s display.  When Aileen asks her, “Are you hungry, Queen Camille?” the girl glares pointedly at the Naturalist’s stage before replying, “I am ravenous.”  By the time Camille has slammed both hands down on the table to call an end to the feast, the crowd is screaming again, surging towards her stage.  

Melisende’s demonstration consists largely of sending shockwaves through the ground beneath the crowd’s feet and gusts of wind to blow through the pine trees.  It is charged with all the power of a queen, but the lack of a visual bores those that are not Elementals, and the crazed look in her eye is enough to deter some of her own as well.  Still, the crowd cheers when it is over, half-drunk on the power of the triplets’ Gifts.

It seems that Lillian had faltered, too, with all of her violence and open hostility towards Camille, which had made it clear that she saw the Poisoner as a threat.  This alone was a sign of weakness, because queens were not supposed to fear anyone.  Not even the sisters that would see them dead.  

Natalia allows herself to smile as the High Priestess rises to speak, reveling in the fact that her queen was victorious for the second time--her Camille, who would be the third consecutive Poisoner Queen crowned in a century.  Aileen says that there are whispers that if the Poisoners’ strength continues, it will become a dynasty.  If she is lucky, Natalia may live to see those whispers come true.  

The High Priestess’s speech teeters on the edge of a full-blown sermon, and it drags so that Natalia finds her mind wandering elsewhere.  Mostly to Camille, covered as she is in poisoned gravy and tainted wine dripping down her chin.  Natalia would like to clean it off herself, in the intimate darkness of their tent.  She would peel off the queen’s ruined  _ Gave  _ gown and kiss her spotless.  

It is only when the old priestess bellows, “Let the Ascension Year commence!” that Natalia’s head snaps up, as if she has been called to attention.  All at once, the queens are ushered off of their stages by foster parents and priestesses.  Natalia catches Camille by the arm as she is dismounting the stairs and does not let go until they reach the safety of their tent.  Aileen immediately posts four war-gifted guards, brought from Indrid Down for this specific purpose, at its entrance.  

“Did I do well?” Camille asks, although her smile suggests that she already knows the answer.

“You were perfect,” Natalia replies, fiddling with the ribbons that would unlace the bodice of the queen’s stained dress.  “The people flocked to you, Camille.  In their hearts, you are already Queen Crowned.”

Every bit of it was true.  The crowd had been pulled towards Camille as if compelled by the hand of the Goddess herself, and Natalia feels so proud at the memory of it that she is nearly crying.  Triumphant as the night is, it makes her feel weak.  Sniffing, she straightens her back and sets to work at untying the bodice, this time in earnest.

And yet, the image of the naturalist and her dog remains, seared behind Natalia’s eyelids.  Most of the island would cheer to see Camille’s throat between its teeth, stupid and bloodthirsty as they are; but Natalia will not allow it.  She cannot stomach the idea of failure, for reasons that extended far beyond her Arron pride.

“I saw the suitors’ faces.  They were afraid,” Camille says, giggling.  

“Mainlander boys are not used to seeing women so powerful as you.  It will be a hard adjustment, for whichever one of them becomes your king-consort.”

Once, when the queen was fourteen and had not yet learned to stop herself from exclaiming whatever she felt, Camille had said, “I should just pick the suitor that looks the most like you.  It will make it easier to pretend that I want him, then.”

But none of the suitors had looked like Natalia.  Two had eyes the deep blue of the sea, and one boy had a lion’s mane of golden-blonde hair; but if Camille were to wake up next to one of them, it would still be very hard to imagine that they were her pale-haired, icy-eyed Nat.

Now, as Natalia works furiously to remove her dress, Camille says nothing.  Instead, she tips her head backwards until it is resting on Natalia’s shoulder, and sighs.  A sharp-nailed hand is tracing circles over her spine, dipping lower.  Her black eyes go wide before sliding shut, leaning into a desperate kiss that Natalia initiates.

All night, Natalia can hardly leave her alone, and Camille is giddy with it.  In three years, it is the most intimate evening they have ever shared.  But even as Natalia is kissing her neck and her stomach is flipping, she knows that something is wrong.  She feels hot tears dropping against her throat.  

“Natalia,” she whispers, and the other girl’s mouth closes against her skin.  “You are kissing me like you think I am going to die.”  

Natalia raises her head, eyes flashing.  She looks fierce as the cobra that Camille had worn across her shoulders for the Disembarking.  “I would not let you die, Camille.”

“And I would not leave you,” Camille replies, catching a strand of ice-blonde hair between her fingertips.  She studies the familiar porcelain face before her, now streaked with tears and hot to the touch.  The fierce look in Natalia’s eyes is shot through with something akin to fear.  It is the most vulnerable that Camille has ever seen her--perhaps it is the most vulnerable that Natalia has ever been with anyone.  

Many queens make lofty speeches upon winning their crown.  They say that they fought for the good of the island and its people, for love of the Goddess.  But Camille knows almost nothing of her people, and even less of the Goddess that placed them there.  She knows only what she has read and seen and breathed in her sequestered years at Greavesdrake.  Belladonna tartlets and long, dark hallways, lined by sconces with black-wax candles.  Dusty books and a fireplace, where she would recline for hours and read the histories aloud to the only Arron that had ever treated her like a person rather than a task.  

If the queen must fight for something, it will be Natalia.


	2. The Ascension Year

In the week since the Ascension began, Camille and Natalia have spent their every waking moment in the Volroy, preparing poisons for the queen’s sisters.  Today, they are dipping silver-tipped arrows in toxic liquid, a single drop of which would be enough to kill a bear.  As soon as possible, it will be used to dispatch the naturalist’s dog.  The queen has begun studying archery for the occasion.

“Should I add Valerian root?” Camille asks, dark eyes narrowed in thought.

Natalia snorts. “To ease its suffering?  I think not.”  

If the poison is effective, the beast will be dead before it can even begin to suffer.  And the Arron’s concoctions have never failed before.

Humming in agreement, Camille dips another arrow.  “They say that the familiar is an extension of its master.  Perhaps my sister will feel it die.”  

Camille has insisted upon killing her sisters slowly, but Natalia grows more anxious by the hour.  Already, her mother has dispatched a wagon-load of poisoned pastries and meat to Wolf Spring, with a driver paid off by the Arrons.  Soon enough, its deadly contents will arrive at Lillian’s front door, disguised as market goods.  Aileen had said that the Milones will not even be clever enough to have them checked first.  When Antonin said that more than just the queen may be sickened, their mother had waved it off as collateral damage.

“It is only a bit of rhubarb leaves and foxglove,” she had said, waving her hand dismissively.  “None of them will die.”

Not yet.

No one is terribly worried about Melisende, mad as she is.  More than one of the Arron’s many eyes and ears in Rolanth says that the queen has confined herself to her rooms, praying feverishly.  They say that she is petrified of death by poison, that she will not eat more than a bite of bread and a sip of water.  That she is plagued by vivid hallucinations of black dogs.  Perhaps she is hoping that her sisters will kill each other, so that she might claim the throne without entering the fray--white-handed and cowardly.  

For Melisende, Natalia and Camille will have to be creative.  She will not accept a prettily-wrapped parcel of tainted candies disguised as a gift from a suitor, or a pair of poisoned gloves from a bribed tailor.  A day trip to Rolanth may be in order, to break into the Westwood’s home and slit the elemental’s throat with a toxin-coated knife.  

Of course, there will be a journey to Wolf Spring as well, once Lillian is weak from the initial poisonings.  Even the thick-headed Milones will become clever when their naturalist is bedridden and nearing her end, and the killing dose must be administered to the queen alone.  It would not do to kill Rebecca or her daughter, Cait.  Although their family has never been as influential amongst their people as the Arrons, they are the crown jewel of that sad, gray seaside town, and the other naturalists would riot.    

Camille is giddy with anticipation, delighted by the thought of riding the darkened back roads with Natalia, wearing hooded cloaks to disguise their distinctive hair and sleeping in the woods.  But Natalia’s stomach is a constant pit of dread, and will be until the other girls are dead and hers has won.  For months, she has begged Camille to give her sisters one strong poison and be done with it.  She would have liked to accost the queens’ carriages on the ride back from Innisfuil and slit their throats, so that it would it would be over and she would have a year to prepare Camille for what would come after.  Marriage and Council selections and power.  

In the end, Natalia relented.  That is why she is here now, watching the queen’s eyes flash as she touches the deadly-sharp tip of a tainted arrow.  She would indulge Camille, allowing her to toy with her sisters for a month or so before the earnest assaults began.  And perhaps it is worth it, just to watch the queen mixing her own wicked cocktails, needing less assistance with every vial.  

Besides, the naturalist would not make it halfway to Indrid Down.  Aileen’s spies reported to her every second of every day.  There was a near-constant procession of them coming and going from Greavesdrake.  On the off chance that she did succeed, the household would be ready.  Every Arron woman has been armed to the teeth since Beltane ended, and little Christophe besides.  Antonin’s sword work has always been excellent, but now he practices more vigorously than ever.  Natalia’s own bedchamber is stocked with nearly as many knives as the Volroy’s armory.

Camille giggles, ending Natalia’s reverie.  When she cocks a white-blonde eyebrow in the queen’s direction, the black-eyed girl only laughs harder.  

“I was thinking of how Melisende will probably starve herself to death before we even try to kill her,” Camille says.

“If we should be so lucky,” Natalia replies.  “I would rather not go to Rolanth.  It reeks of elemental filth.”

“We will be in and out within a day or two, Natalia.”  Camille has not called her Nat since they returned from Beltane.  There has not been another tender moment between them that would allow her to do so.  Nothing so intimate as the night after the Quickening, when Natalia had clutched at her so desperately that her fingernails left half-crescent bruises on the queen’s arms.  Camille would think that she had dreamt it, if the fierce look did not linger still in Natalia’s eyes.  Now, there are only stolen kisses as the moon rises above the Volroy, and a shared bed surrounded always by knives.  “I promise.”

“You may poison them until the week before next Beltane, if you’d like,” Natalia replies.  She even offers Camille a small, genuine smile.  “So long as it is glorious.”

 

A week later, a spy comes with the first report of sickness in the Milone house.  Rebecca and her daughter have been vomiting for days thanks to a toxic pie, and their queen is in a worse state, having reacted violently to the rhubarb leaves.  Even the dog is ill from tainted meat.  

Upon hearing the news, Camille is so delighted that she claps.  She almost forgets herself, wanting to throw her arms around Natalia’s neck, until she looks into Aileen’s solemn face.  It is unreadable, but Camille imagines that those cold eyes are full of doubt.  

“Queen Camille,” Aileen says, forcing a smile, “would you leave us, please?  I need to speak with my daughter.  I see so little of her these days.”

Camille obeys, dipping her head towards the eldest Arron as she turns to go.  It is a sign of deference and respect, unfit for a queen.  Later, she will be scolded for it; but she does it anyhow, hoping that it will make Aileen softer towards her daughter.  An Arron loves nothing more than to be reminded of their own power over the island and its queens alike.

Natalia knows that Camille will be waiting for her in the corridor, eager to leave for the Volroy and its cabinets full of poison.  She hopes that the heavy oaken door will muffle the sounds of whatever tongue-lashing she is about to receive.  

“You must leave for Wolf Spring soon, Natalia.  To finish her off while she is still weak.”  Aileen’s voice is cold as ever, but her mother’s frustration is evident in her rigid shoulders and tightly-clasped hands.  “Otherwise, we can expect a swift retaliation.  Perhaps within the week, if the naturalist is healed quickly enough.”

“Mother, the naturalist could not find her way to Greavesdrake.  She would be lost in the woods along the road, distracted by squirrels and rabbits.”  Natalia is attempting to appeal to her mother’s prejudice--an effective tactic, on most days.  But today, Aileen’s mood is so foul that she seems to be on the verge of a tantrum.  It is disconcerting how much the Arron matriarch’s current state reminds Natalia of Genevieve.  

“Lillian will not be distracted after this.  Her hackles will rise, and then she will make her way here.  She will come with her beast and have it tear Camille’s heart from her chest.”  Aileen can see that she is squirming, now.  Her eldest, always so composed, paling at the mention of harm to the queen.  As if that is not a queen’s purpose, to kill and die in the name of the Goddess.  “And she will have it take yours, Daughter, if you stand in her way.  I am afraid that you have forgotten, Natalia, that they are not like us.”

“Of course not, Mother.  They are queens.”  But when she says it, it is through gritted teeth.

“It is not just that,” Aileen snaps.  “Camille was born for this, Natalia.  She is not the wide-eyed girl that you would make her out to be.”  

Natalia has heard enough.  It is the same rhetoric that Genevieve has screeched at her a thousand times.   _The queens are not even people, Natalia.  The Goddess demands it, Natalia.  It is their destiny, Natalia.  Your softness is ruining her._

The other Arrons would have preferred Camille to be emotionless, a killing machine and nothing more.  They are bitterly disappointed by the fact that she is a warm thing with a beating heart instead of a monster.    

But Natalia can be that monster, if she must.  If it will save her queen.

“She will not fail, Mother.  We will leave for Wolf Spring tonight.”  

“Very good.”  Aileen relaxes, her scowling mouth settling into a straight line.  It could not be mistaken for a smile, but it is the closest thing she has to offer.  “Arm yourselves well, but pack lightly.  I will see to it that you have provisions and bedrolls.  As for the poisons, take only what you will need for the queens.”

Camille will need calming and convincing, if they are to leave tonight.  She will need things that the other Arrons cannot see--kisses and gentle words in front of the library fire, with her dark head resting upon Natalia’s lap.  

Just as Natalia turns to go, Aileen clears her throat.  “One last thing, Daughter.”

She has gone stiff again, her white hands on the tabletop curled nearly into fists.     

“Do not return until two queens are dead--ours or theirs.”  

 

In the dark of night, Indrid Down is an eerily quiet place.  It is disconcerting to see the ever-bustling city gone still and silent.  Natalia spurs her horse on, wishing to be through the gates with her back to the looming spires of the Volroy as soon as possible.   Aileen had ordered them to sleep through the day, but the queen was far too restless.  She had insisted on packing and unpacking a dozen times, cataloguing poisons and testing arrows while Natalia hovered beside her.  Now, Camille clings to her back, already snoring softly.  

In the end, it was easier to take Natalia’s mare, Mithi, than to attempt to control and care for two beasts--they are not naturalists, after all.  Mithi was predictable--if a little old--and Natalia could trust her to stay put in whatever thicket they would have to hide her in once they reached Wolf Spring.  And then, when the time came, Mithi could spirit them away without leaving more than a hoofprint in the dirt road.

Behind Natalia, Camille whimpers in her sleep.  

 

_“Dacia, are you hungry?”_

_Lillian is standing at the edge of the Breccia Domain, swaying and sickly but alive.  Her skin is gray as grave-dirt.  As Camille watches, her sister’s cracked, bluish lips pull back to reveal a mouth full of fangs.  Beside her, the dog’s tongue is lolling out of its mouth.  It has a hundred rows of knife-sharp teeth, all on display as it drops Melisende’s still-beating heart at the queen’s feet._

_Lillian lifts the offering to her lips, sniffing before unhinging her jaw to swallow it whole._

_“I am ravenous,” the dog growls._

_Impossible.  This is impossible, Camille thinks._

_Then, Dacia lunges forward to bite out her heart, and she cannot think anymore._

 

Camille jolts awake with a shriek.  Natalia jerks the reigns violently in surprise, and Mithi startles so that she nearly bucks them both off.  Screams subside quickly to sobs, until Natlia is forced to halt.   

“My heart, Nat.  She wants to eat my heart,” the queen whimpers, her body wracked with shivers.

Natalia knows who _she_ is without asking.  Dismounting, she searches for Camille’s hands in the dark folds of her borrowed riding cloak.  When she finds them, her fingers curl around those familiar, fine-boned wrists so tightly that she can feel the queen’s fluttering pulse.  

“Camille,” she whispers, “it was only a dream.”

And Lillian is as good as dead, she thinks, because she knows more of her mother’s schemes than Camille will ever be privy to.  As soon as it reached her that the naturalist was fond of pecan rolls, while Rebecca Milone and her daughter were deathly allergic, Aileen had seen to it that they were included in the shipment of tainted goods.  The poison was one of Natalia’s own blends, designed to act so slowly that Lillian could glut herself on the sweets for days before sickening.  Combined with the quick toxicity of the foxglove and rhubarb leaves, it would be enough to lay the other queen so low that Camille could pour the final poison down her sister’s throat without so much as a whimper of protest.   

“It was only a dream,” Natalia murmurs again, thumbs moving in circles over Camille’s damp palms.  “Your sister would have to eat the hearts of a dozen Arrons first.  We will not let anything hurt you.  You are our queen.”

But Camille is not a queen tonight.  She is just a girl, frightened and shaking in the dark of the woods.  If she could, Natalia would turn Mithi and lead them further into the trees, away from Indrid Down and Wolf Spring and the whole cursed island.  Away from what the Goddess would have them do.  In the past, suitors had tried as much with their favored queen, to steal her away and save her life.  Mainlander boys are such romantic, impulsive fools.

But Natalia is not a king-consort, and she is certainly not foolish--foolish enough to believe that loving a queen could be an easy thing; to believe that Camille is nothing more than a black-eyed girl; to believe that being born an Arron and a poisoner has not already sealed her fate.

It is still hours before sunup, and Natalia knows that every minute of soothing is a minute wasted.  She reaches into the folds of her cloak and produces a belladonna tartlet wrapped in wax paper, grinning as she watches Camille’s black eyes begin to sparkle.  

“Eat,” she says, already preparing to lead Mithi back to the path, “and rest, if you can.  You need your strength.”

After that, Camille falls back to snoring and Natalia rides easily, occasionally fingering the twin glass vials in her pocket.  At this time tomorrow, they will be in Wolf Spring pouring the contents of one of them into the last drink of a queen.  

 

Two days pass, plagued by storms and the uneven terrain of the backroads.  Natalia had hoped that they would be in a inn somewhere by now, drying out in front of a fire and charting a course to Rolanth.  It is only on the fourth night, when she sees the squat shape of Wolf Spring Temple shining like a beacon in the distance, that her mood brightens.  

After tethering Mithi securely to a tree at the forest’s edge, Natalia shakes Camille awake with an excited hiss of the queen’s name.  

They trek to the Milone’s farm in stealthy silence, both clutching hand-drawn maps and a knife apiece.  The twin vials of poison are heavy in Camille’s pocket,  and the rustle of the arrows bouncing against her back is as loud as a scream.  Her grip on the carved handle of her blade is so tight that her knuckles have gone white, and she can see that Natalia’s hand trembles, shaking the map.  When the house comes into view, illuminated by the full moon and with no guard but a few briar bushes, Camille falters.

“I should do this alone,” she whispers, so low that Natalia almost misses it.

“No,” Natalia snaps, pale eyes sparking.  The queen turns away, gaze fixed squarely on the Milone’s only lighted window.  The window where Lillian must be waiting.  “Camille, no.”

“The Goddess put me here to do this,” Camille says, pleading.  “Not you, Natalia.  Please.”

Natalia swallows hard, her face twisted with the same tortured look that it had on the night of the Quickening, when she dug bruises into Camille’s pale arms and begged her not to die.  “If she sends the dog after you, run--I mean it, Camille.  Do not try to fight her.  Run straight to me.”

Camille nods, her big black eyes gone flat and solemn.  “I promise, Nat.”

She kisses her, then turns to go.

 

The queen finds her sister in the lighted room, sleeping fitfully with Dacia at her feet.  Her nightgown is stained from sickening, her forehead slick with sweat.  The small room reeks of a body already half-decayed.  Not a single Milone had stirred at the sound of Camille’s soft footsteps on the wooden stairs or the creak of Lillian’s door.

They have given her up for dead, Camille realizes, and the horror of it nearly bowls her over.

And then, she thinks: Could rhubarb leaves do all of this?

But then she shakes her head, knowing now that it does not matter what Lillian has eaten or what the Milones have done, because she is here to kill a queen and nothing more.

On the sick-stained bed, Lillian is blinking herself awake.  Camille clears her throat as if to introduce herself, and her sister lets out a tortured laugh filled with hate.  

“I thought you’d never come,” the naturalist rasps.  Her chapped lips are parted expectantly.  “Go on, then.  If I weren’t so weak I would do it myself.”

“You will not even fight me?” Camille asks, genuinely shocked.  Natalia could have poisoned Lillian a dozen times over, by now; but this is not what Camille expected.  She had thought to catch her sister in broad daylight, hunting in the forest.  She had thought to kill that beastly familiar with a toxic arrow and force poison down its master’s throat.

She had not expected a wraith, laid low and begging to die.

“How can I fight when I can’t even stand?” Lillian hisses.  

“Dacia,” Camille splutters, and the dog raises its head weakly in response.  

“Don’t insult me by playing dumb, you poisoner bitch.”  The words are spoken with such venom that it takes her aback.  “Both of us are poisoned.  Half-dead, for almost a week now.”

This was never what Camille intended, or read in the histories.  The Queens of Old had battled with their sisters in front of the entire island, beating each other back with awesome displays of divine power until the unlucky two were struck down by the strongest triplet.  

How did it ever come to this?

“Do what you want with me,” Lillian continues, her sallow cheeks suddenly wet with tears, “but give Dacia something quick.  Please.”

She turns her eyes on Camille for the first time--black eyes so much like her own, devoid of life and pleading silently for mercy.

Camille inhales shakily, remembering the quiver of arrows slung fast across her back, each one silver-tipped and deadly enough to kill a horse within the space of a minute.  Reaching over her shoulder, she draws two out with shaking hands and moves towards Lillian’s bed, nearly gagging at the stench.  

With her head tipped back, the soft skin of Dacia’s throat is easy enough to pierce through.  At the intrusion, the dog that Camille had thought would be her undoing offers little more than a low whine.  Lillian’s silent weeping becomes a full-fledged fit of sobs, so violent that she sickens and just barely misses the sleeve of Camille’s dark cloak.  

“Please,” she begs, “send me after her.”

Camille feels her own tears starting, dropping from her cheeks to the collar of her sister’s ruined nightdress.  “Is there anything else--before I do it, is there anything else?”

“Give Melly something quick, too,” Lillian whispers, limp arm turned upwards so that every blue vein of her wrist is exposed.  “She’s so afraid to die.”

Camille pierces the skin, then, unable to listen anymore, and Lillian gasps exactly once before going completely slack.

 

For two days, Camille is inconsolable.  Natalia nearly carries her out of Wolf Spring, desperate to flee before day breaks and the Milones find their dead queen.  A message is dispatched to Aileen that there will be some delay on their trip to Rolanth for purely weather-related reasons, adding that Camille had killed Lillian with all the poise of a true Arron.  

In truth, Camille is sick as soon as they reach the forest, and again once they return to the path.  She sobs and mutters, “It was so horrible, Natalia, it was so horrible.”

“If it was not her, it would have been you--and do you think she would have wept?” Natalia says, struggling to keep her voice level.  Camille should be singing with triumph.  She is one step closer to the crown.

Camille shakes her head, fat tears still clinging to her chin.  She will fold, of course, obedient and eager to please as a little child.  “No, Natalia.”

But still she mourns for two days and two nights in a secluded Highgate inn, hidden by a locked door and drawn curtains.  When Camille allows it, Natalia strokes her hair and kisses her forehead; often, she does not want to be touched at all.  She wants only to weep and wretch and wring her hands at the thought of killing Melisende, the very thing she had giggled over in the Volroy not a month before.

“She called her Melly,” Camille whispers, head tucked against Natalia’s chest, “and it made me remember.”

“Remember what, sweetheart?”  

Natalia tries her best to be gentle, weaving a loose braid into the queen’s black hair.  It is the last morning that they are to spend in Highgate before setting out towards Rolanth.

“My sisters,” she whimpers, “at the Black Cottage.  How we called her Melly.  How we made a game of sneaking up behind her so that she would jump.”

“It is just a memory.  A memory has no power,” Natalia says, moving to tilt Camille’s chin upwards.  “Look at me, Camille: A memory has no power, but you do.  The Goddess gave it to you for a reason.”

It has been at least a decade since Natalia has been to pray at the Temple or receive a blessing from a priestess; but for Camille, she can pretend to believe as wholeheartedly as any fanatic.  She will pretend that the power of an ancient, faceless Goddess is what keeps the island afloat rather than the sheer, concentrated willpower of her family.  If it gives Camille the strength to survive the Ascension, Natalia will say anything.

 

_“Give her something quick,” Lillian rasps, speaking to Camille from somewhere deep inside of a bloated corpse._

_Her sister has been laid out on a stone slab in Wolf Spring Temple, left to rot as the Ascension Year winds on.  Until another triplet dies, she will not be allowed to join the other forgotten queens at the bottom of the Breccia Domain.  Camille can sense that she is growing impatient._

_“Melly is afraid to die,” the dog says, whimpering.  Its body is sprawled out at Lillian’s blue-gray feet.  Camille finds that already, she cannot quite remember its name._

_“Give her something quick and then forget that we ever were,” her sister whispers.  Cracked lips curl into a wicked smile.  “Forget what will be.  Two more of us, when She is done with you.  Forget that we are cursed.”_

 

The path to Rolanth is a tricky one, requiring long stretches of backroad riding in order to skirt the Seawatch Mountains and Indrid Down.  It would not do for Camille to be seen on the road, just now, when the entire island is already abuzz with the news of Lillian’s death.

Natalia is afraid that Camille would sicken at the tales that they are telling, of how she poured poison down Lillian and Dacia’s throats and shot them with tainted arrows after they were already long dead; of how she had to be dragged from the house by servants so that she would not massacre the rest of the Milone’s household as well; of her eye for detail and her wicked, clever cruelty.

Natalia suspects that the last rumor is courtesy of her mother, a whisper begun in an attempt to make Camille appear strong and capable instead of simply murderous.  Aileen must have known that they were holed away in Highgate for reasons beyond a spring squall.

The queen sleeps poorly, dozing as they ride only to wake screaming a moment later.  Natalia wonders if Nicola and Sylvia were haunted so by nightmares and the resurfacing of things best left forgotten.  Every day, Camille seems to remember another snippet of her childhood at the Black Cottage; and every day, it is harder for her to twist her lips into a smile at the thought of a crown.  

It is harder to forget that they had called her elemental sister Melly, once, and scared her purely for sport.  

They rest for a day in Prynn, enjoying the hospitality of the few poisoners that linger there.  Camille is delighted by the city’s ancient architecture and quaint little shops, but Natalia thinks that it reeks of weak gifts and horse manure.  She is ready to descend upon Rolanth and claim Camille’s crown once and for all.

Save for Melisende, the entire Westwood household is rendered useless by nothing more than a sleeping water, distributed at dinner by a serving-girl turned Arron spy.  Natalia passes her on their way into the house, pressing the first of many gold coins into the girl’s damp palm.  

Yet again, Camille insists on killing Melisende alone; but this time, Natalia is at least allowed to pace the lower level of the house, standing guard.  Her ears prick at the slightest creak of the Westwood’s ancient floorboards.

Camille finds Melisende’s door locked, with two drugged guards-women slumping against it besides.  She shifts them to the side and uses a hairpin to pick the lock, a trick that Antonin had taught her as a child; through the wood, she can already hear her sister’s panicked whimpers, and Camille is almost certain that she will sicken.  The quiver of arrows upon her back is like a sack of stones.

As their eyes meet, the first thing that Melisende does is scream.  When no one comes to save her, she falls to her knees, tearing wildly at her hair.  

“Please,” she screeches, and Camille is terrified that her sister’s voice will be loud enough to rouse the guards outside.  A lock of hair comes away in Melisende’s clenched fist, but still she does not cease.  From her place by the door, Camille can see that the elemental has nearly made herself bald.    

Candles flicker wildly on all sides of the room, some in sconces and others in pools of wax upon the floor.  A small tremor rocks the house, but it dies so quickly that Camille almost thinks that she has imagined it until Melisende cries out in agonized frustration.  

“Goddess, please!  Please!”  Her sister’s hands are flying about her face, clawing at it, drawing blood.  Camille notices for the first time that they are surrounded by scattered crusts of moldy bread and overturned pitchers of tepid water.

“I will give you something quick, Melly,” Camille whispers, parroting Lillian.  For a moment, the childhood nickname brings a flicker of recognition to her sister’s smoldering eyes, and Camille feels herself buckling.  She gropes for an arrow, not bothering with the bow.  

Melisende screams at every step her sister takes, backed into a corner as she is.  What is left of her ruined hair hangs in a curtain across her bleeding face.  

“Poor, sweet Melly,” a voice whispers--Lillian’s voice.  “Do it now, Camille.  Do it now and let us rest.”

One sister is before her, screaming and so far gone that she is practically dead; another hangs at her back, a spectre caught somewhere in between two worlds.  Camille’s hand is steady as she plunges the arrow into Melisende’s neck and rids herself of the both of them.

 

Her sisters are dead almost five months before they are laid to rest in the Breccia Domain.  The priestesses would have her wait until Samhain to perform the Rites of Ascension, the first of which is to watch as the other queen’s black-shrouded bodies plummet into the heart of the island, returned to the Goddess from whence they came.  When Camille asks if the bodies will be rotten by that time, she is told that a queen never rots.  She only rests, frozen and awaiting her final voyage into the dark.

Natalia takes her to visit the bodies more than once, as is customary.  Priestesses in each city, some whose eyes are hard with resentment, lead them into crypt-like rooms in the bowels of her sister’s Temples.  Both rooms reek of incense and herbs that the priestesses say are a part of their daily blessings over the queen’s bodies; but Camille is certain that it is only to cover the stench.  

Lillian rests on nothing but a stone slab, her black eyes not even pushed shut or covered with coins.  There is still a bit of froth on her chapped lips.  Dacia is laid across her feet, a mass of dull black fur and long legs akimbo.  The only kindness that they had done their fallen queen was to put her in a clean nightdress.

“If it were not for the eyes, she would look as if she were only sleeping,” Natalia comments, fingers moving over the cold lids to slide them shut.  “Well done,” she adds, trying to ignore the fact that Camille’s own black eyes are brimming with tears.

More care has been exercised by the priestesses at Rolanth.  Melisende’s hair is arranged so that one would have to squint to see that she had ripped most of it out, and her slab is covered with sweet-smelling white flowers.

“Carnations and chrysanthemums,” a young, fiery-haired priestess says when Natalia inquires as to what they are, “for innocence and grief.”

The priestess’s turns her stony gaze directly to Camille and holds it there.  Natalia regrets asking.  If a servant at Greavesdrake were half so insolent, Aileen would have them whipped.  

“She would look very beautiful,” Camille manages, “if it were not for all the cuts on her face.”

Long, ragged claw marks mar the dead queen’s pale cheeks.  Some are scars, while others were made at the moment of her death--those will never heal.  All of them have been meticulously cleaned and covered with white powder, but it is not enough.  Camille knows that the priestess would blame her for them--she has heard the tales, no matter how Natalia tries to shield her from it.  The people say that she watched as the other queen’s throats were poisoned shut, letting them tear themselves half apart in their agony.  They say that it took each girl hours to finally die.

They will never know the truth, that she stabbed arrows into her sisters’ skin as a mercy and drank the elaborate, caustic poisons that she was meant to use on them.  Of course, it had done nothing to her beyond a slight burn going down.

Finally, the dark fingers of the winter freeze begin to take hold of the island, and with it  comes Samhain.  On the day of the first Rite, Camille stands shivering at the edge of the Breccia Domain, surrounded by white cloaks on all sides and staring down into the dead faces of her sisters.  The fiery-haired girl from Rolanth is standing over Melisende, serrated knife in hand, as the High Priestess calls down one final blessing.  

When they go to cut off the queens’ heads and arms, Camille shrieks.  She had thought that that was only a myth, one perpetuated by the savage War Queens of old; but the High Priestess does not put a stop to it, and Camille is made to watch as they saw through her sisters’ long-dead flesh.  The last thing that they do is carve out the hearts, reaching through the twinned, ruined ribcages to wrest them out.  After it is finished, the priestesses wrap each piece in oil-soaked cloth and hurl it all into the black heart of the Breccia Domain.

 

At the bottom of the Breccia Domain, three dead queens are waiting.  

The first body thuds to the floor with a sickening crack, followed by the head and arms.  Another comes in quick succession, and another still.  The last bundle is smaller--a familiar, the dead queens think.  So the Naturalist lost, after all.  Two of them had been betting on the Naturalist.

Quickly, the queens move to unwrap the parcels of cloth and attach their contents to the proper corpse.  It will not be long before the severed heads blink themselves awake, and it is never pleasant to find oneself without a body as well as dead.

One of the queens hangs back, a dead hand raised to cover her mouth as if she does not believe.  “Come on then, Nicola,” says one of the others, a thickset girl with hateful eyes, “it looks as if yours won, anyhow.”

“They were all mine,” Nicola answers, still refusing to move.

The thickset girl rolls her hateful eyes, struggling to haul one of the now-intact bodies to its feet.  The body’s head rolls to one side before snapping straight up and beginning to scream.

“That must be the elemental,” another girl says--a tall, willowy thing with a hawk perched on her shoulder.  She unwraps the smaller parcel and sets free a big, black dog.  

“Shut up, Dacia,” the thickset one growls.  “She’s afraid, is all.  So were you.”

The dog’s ears prick up at the mention of the name, and Nicola forces the lump in her throat to go down.  Her strong, naturalist girl must have given her familiar that name as a sort of tribute.  It makes her dead eyes water.

“Seline,” Nicola whispers, “bring her to me.  Give her here.”

Seeing the look on the dead queen’s tear-streaked face, her stubborn sister relents.  She huffs as she guides the reassembled girl, still screaming, towards her mother’s outstretched arms.  Across the way, the naturalist is stirring, black head cradled in Dacia’s lap.  Already, the rock walls ring with the sounds of wailing.

“Melisende,” Nicola coos, petting her daughter’s scab-covered scalp.  “My sweet little Melly.  What happened to you?”

Then, her hand finds the hole in her daughter’s pale throat, and it is as good as an answer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is the Ascension Year! This was so fun (and gory) to write. I know that I have a grand total of one reader because they left kudos and a comment, so shout out to you! I am really mostly writing this because it is super fun. I also love writing in the style of TDC because it's so different from how I write in my own stories (I hate third person, and I almost never use the fancy language Kendare uses!). This is probably going to be my favorite chapter to write just because murder and sibling rivalry and....all of it! So fun. :)


	3. Camille's Coronation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Vague allusions to sex, in case that makes all two of my readers uncomfortable. Nothing raunchy!

“Queen Camille,” the handmaiden says, “it is time.”

Camille is barely listening.  Two of the Arron’s house-girls have been braiding pearls into her hair for what feels like hours, and the repetitive motion had lulled her nearly to sleep.  The speckles of white against her black hair look unnatural, as if she has suddenly turned old.  

Today, the last of the Rites of Ascension will be completed.  By sunset, Camille will have officially taken her throne, her king-consort, and her new position as the third-consecutive Poisoner Queen Crowned of Fennbirn.  It is all that she can think about as the handmaiden pulls her up by the shoulders, smoothing the back of the queen’s white dress.  Today is the last time that Camille will ever wear anything but black.

Outside, the wind whips through Innisfuil Valley, unseasonably chilly.  Camille suspects that the bitter elementals gathered to the west are to blame for it, but she cannot be sure; and besides, they are all her people now.  Elemental and naturalist, willing and unwilling--they are her subjects until the Goddess sees fit to make it otherwise.  

Natalia is waiting across the way, having crept back to her own bed before dawn came and the priestesses bustled into Camille’s tent to wake her.  The Arron girl is composed as ever, hair slicked back into a bun and black dress neatly buttoned.  All that remains of the night before is the sly smile that she shares with Camille and a purplish, teeth-mark bruise on her right shoulder-blade.  Rushing forward, Natalia falls into step with the priestesses escorting Camille towards the Breccia Domain until she is standing beside the queen herself.

“The mainlander is going to salivate at the sight of you,” Natalia says, careful to keep her voice at a level that only the queen can hear over the tramping of the priestess’s boots.  

“He will not be the only one, it seems,” Camille replies, one hand darting out to squeeze Natalia’s arm before pulling away again.    

At that, Natalia does her best to laugh, fighting to keep the sound from becoming a hard bark of bitterness.  She has been gaping at the sight of the queen since she was twelve years old and woke one morning with an ache in her chest that has yet to cease.  Since Camille was barely a slip of a girl, half the woman that she has become--that Natalia has helped her to become, through tears and blood and enough poison to fill up the sea.  It hardly seems fair that after tonight she will have to share, when the mainlander has done nothing for Camille beyond give her little trinkets and kiss her hand at the Samhain feast.

Still, Charles Bennett was undoubtedly the best of the lot, and clever besides.  He had waited until both of Camille’s sisters were dead to call on her at all.  At dinner one night, Aileen had pressed him as to why, her stern mouth quirking into a stiff smile, attempting joviality.

“I did not want to set my sights on any of them until I was certain who would win,” he had replied, laughing.  It was the type of logic that the most discerning of Arrons would employ, and after that, they took to him immediately.

And he is only a figurehead, Natalia reminds herself.  King-consorts are nothing more than a symbol of peace with the mainlanders, a tradition enforced by the Temple since Elo the Fire Breather’s marriage to an outsider ended three centuries of war.

Suddenly, Natalia’s reverie is interrupted by a chain of white-cloaked priestesses blocking her path.  She nearly collides with one of the girls as Camille steps carefully around, looking back at Natalia with wide eyes that are helpless and almost frightened.  Get out of my way, you fools, Natalia wants to say; but she knows that this is as far as she will be allowed to go.  The remaining trek through the southern Innisfuil woods and to the Breccia Domain beyond will be made by Camille and the High Priestess alone.

The High Priestess walks at a clip in spite of her age, as if she does not want to keep the Goddess waiting.  Queen Camille scurries to keep up, bogged down as she is by the heavy fabric of her wedding dress.

“We are nearly there, my queen,” the High Priestess says, as if Camille could not feel and smell the Domain in the air around her, pulsing out power and reeking of death.  A serrated knife glints in the old woman’s hand.  The queen wonders if, perhaps, it is the same one that dismembered her sisters so many months ago.  Severed their heads and arms, sliced through their chests and prised out their hearts.  

As soon as the pair reaches the Breccia Domain, the High Priestess wastes no time in beginning the Rite.  Without speaking, she takes the queen’s hand and slices into the palm with the curved blade of her knife.  Camille hisses with pain, but does not flinch away; the priestesses at Indrid Down Temple had been preparing her for this since Samhain, slicing into her palm so that they might mix it into salves and potions for the sick.  

“It is low magic,” Natalia had insisted, flying into a rage as soon as she laid eyes on the first cut.  “To practice low magic is blasphemous--treasonous, even.  And on the queen!  Who did this to you, Camille?  Mother will have them flogged.”    

But the High Priestess herself had insisted that bloodletting was integral to the Rites of Ascension.  As Natalia stood fuming in her quarters, the old fool had even had the audacity to preach to her.  

“The island creates the queens, would you not agree?  As a result, the queen must give her life to the island, in the literal as well as figurative sense.  Camille is simply giving the Goddess what She is is owed.  It is cyclical, my dear, and quite beautiful.”

So Natalia had relented, although it was mostly at Aileen’s insistence.  “The Temple must remain subdued, Natalia.  We have them exactly where they belong.  I will not allow you to draw their ire now and destroy what the Council has worked for.”

And now Camille’s palm has been marred with one final, clean gash from the High Priestess’s consecrated blade.  She stands tall at the edge of the Breccia Domain, wedding dress billowing around her legs, letting her queenly blood drip into a vial made from black glass.  At her back, the wind in the pines seems to whistle its approval.  

“It is a lovely day for a wedding,” the High Priestess muses.  “And a coronation.”

And a  _ Gave Noir _ , Camille thinks.  It is the only bright spot in a day full of hollow ceremony and posturing in front of the mainlanders.  She will gorge herself on wolfsbane wine and spider-venom caramels until it drips down her chin onto the front of her pristine white gown, and the mainlanders will tremble while the island roars its approval.      

Afterwards, the queen will be escorted to the large, solitary bridal tent to be prepared for the first night alone with her king-consort.  As Aileen’s heir, Natalia will be allowed to dress her under the supervision of the priestesses.  It will be a small comfort, at least, to feel Natalia’s deft fingers tugging the braids from hair and buttoning the back of her nightdress.  

But then Natalia will leave, and the priestesses will assume their positions outside of the tent, and Camille will be alone with her husband for the first time.  Genevieve says that the thought of it should make her giddy, to deflower and be deflowered by a man as handsome as Charles Bennett; but instead, it makes her sick.  What transpires between them that night is meant to cement their bond in the eyes of the Goddess; and afterwards, Charles will show his family the blood-stained bridal sheets as proof that Camille had saved herself for him.

And there will be blood--all her life, Natalia has made sure of that.  She would never allow herself to go so far as to jeopardize Camille’s marriage, no matter how often she was tempted to.  

But the bond in the eyes of the Goddess, the joining of two souls as one...for Camille, that is what will be impossible; because since she was a child, her soul has belonged to Natalia.           

Finally, when the vial is filled to the brim with blood, the High Priestess wraps Camille’s hand with a black bandage and presses the vial into the queen’s palm.

“For seventeen years, the island has awaited its next queen,” the old woman says.  “And the Goddess has sent you.  Will you serve them well?”  

“Yes,” Camille says, her voice carefully measured to match the priestess’s monotone.  “I am a daughter of the Goddess and Her hand on the island.  I will seek Her guidance in all things.  I will honor Her ways and follow the path which She has paved for me.”

“Very well,” the High Priestess says.  “The Goddess provides.  Now, we must acknowledge her generosity with an offering.”

At that, Camille loosens her grip on the vial and watches, transfixed, as it is swallowed by the gaping black mouth of the Breccia Domain.

 

At the bottom of the Breccia Domain, five dead queens are playing cards.  

“Seline is cheating again,” says the tall queen with a hawk on her shoulder and a dog sprawled at her feet.

“Dacia is whining again,” Seline retorts, her voice high-pitched and mocking.  “These are my cards, lest we forget.”

“Only because you died with them in your pocket,” Dacia snaps.  “I can’t believe that the Temple allowed you to you keep them.  They took all of my clothing and jewelry and left me in this thin black slip.”  

Seline only shrugs, craning her neck to peek at the hand of the queen to her right.  “The priestesses at Rolanth Temple were very accommodating.”

“Elementals are a pious lot,” says the girl to Seline’s right, snorting and turning her cards away from the older queen’s prying eyes.  “They had Melly sacrifice hares and eat the hearts to strengthen her gift.  Look at all the good it did.”  The queen jerks her head towards a girl sitting slightly removed from the circle of players, although she still clutches a hand of cards to her torn-open chest.  

“Behave yourself, Lillian,” hisses the queen to her left, extending a stiff arm to cuff the the girl’s ear.  “Melly was always the sensitive one.  Even when the three of you were just babies.”

Lillian is just preparing a sharp retort when the queens’ bickering is interrupted by a sharp crash.  Before them, a glass vial lands and promptly bursts apart in the middle of the stone slab that was serving as their makeshift card-table.

“Blood,” Dacia murmurs.  “Nicola, is this not the last Rite?  Has Beltane come so soon?”

The dead queens have spent so long playing cards and bickering in the endless dark that they have lost track of time.  Lillian and Melisende’s arrival had provided nothing more than a temporary distraction before they fell again to old routines.  

Nicola shakes her head grimly.  “Yes,” she says.  “But something is wrong.  The vial is meant to land directly in the Cave of the Goddess.  It is an offering.”

“This whole damned pit is Her cave,” Seline hisses, gesturing towards the quickly-dissipating puddle before them.  “Look at the way the rock swallows the blood.  As if the Goddess is here with us, lapping it up.”

As the last of the blood sinks into the rock, a long, low sigh reverberates through the stone cavern around them, and a collective shudder passes through each of the five dead queens.  Nicola remembers the sacred words of the  _ Gave Noir _ , so familiar to her after years of speaking them at every feast and high festival: The offering is adequate.  The Goddess is pleased.

But, as the dead queens know, She will not be sated for long.

 

Camille’s wedding ceremony is a long and painful affair.  It begins at the height of the day and does not end until the sky has turned from blue to orange.  With the spring sun beating down on the raised dais, the thick fabric of the queen’s wedding dress is hot as a woodstove.  She is only thankful that it is not black.   

“Do you swear to uphold the sacred truce with the mainland, forged in fire by Queen Elo and preserved by the will of the Goddess?”  Camille simply nods, although she is allowed to speak at any time she likes.  It is the first in an exhaustive list of commands thinly disguised as questions. 

On the beach below, Natalia observes the proceedings with a critical eye.  Aileen and Genevieve flank her on either side, both of them nodding approvingly after every movement of the queen’s own dark head.  Natalia mimics the gesture at first, but fears that the ceaseless bobbing coupled with her own nausea may cause her to sicken before the ceremony’s end.

Every word from the High Priestess’s mouth has a terrible air of finality to it--pledges of loyalty and of love, of trust and hope and adoration.  To love the island and the Goddess first, and the king-consort second--at that, Natalia nearly scoffs aloud.  In the queen’s soft heart, she will always be first.  Camille has told her so.  

Natalia can only pray that that will not change after tonight, when she is forced to leave Camille with the mainlander, in a secluded tent so far from her own.  That there is no power, of the Goddess or otherwise, that could turn the queen’s heart away from her.    

Natalia has spent years steeling herself for this very day, for that very moment; but now that it looms so close on the horizon, the strongest Arron and heir to Aileen’s household finds that she can hardly bear it.  Icy Natalia, laid low by the queen that she was meant to serve with every ounce of her strength.  

It is only when the wedding ends and the crown is being lowered onto Camille’s bowed head that Natalia allows herself to smile.  The golden circlet is intricately carved, twisted through with Poisoner snakes and Naturalist vines, Elemental flames and Warrior’s arrows.  It is even studded with small, gemstone eyes for the Sight-gifted, although there has not been an oracle queen that was not drowned since the days of old.  On its own, the crown is a stunning piece of metalwork; but atop Camille's dark head, it becomes the single-greatest symbol of power on the island.  Those who had whispered of Camille's weakness need only see her now, head held high in a crown as old as time itself, and they would have no more doubts.  

“ _ Vivat regina _ ,” the High Priestess concludes, her voice booming but solemn as ever.  It is one of the many mainlander phrases that became commonplace after Elo’s treaty.  

The crowd on the beach echoes the old priestess’s words, beginning as a murmur and crescendoing to a scream.  Natalia bellows along with them, even if the words feel hollow, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing.  For Camille, she will say anything.

“ _ Vivat regina _ ! ” she shouts.

Long live the queen.

 

In the bridal tent that night, Natalia’s fingers shake as she takes down Camille’s hair.  The queen’s wedding gown, ruined as it was by  _ Gave  _ stains, has already been thrown into one of the ceremonial fires outside.  Under the watchful eye of the priestesses, Natalia could hardly bear to undo the elaborate laces of the bodice and the petticoats beneath, knowing all the while that tonight, Camille’s bare skin and loose hair are not for her to enjoy.

Beneath her hands, Camille shivers and trembles like a frightened child. 

The night before, the queen had voiced her secret fears.  

“Genevieve told me it is going to hurt,” she whispered, her dark head cradled in Natalia’s lap.  

“If the mainlander hurts you, he will be poisoned and sunk to the bottom of the sea before sunrise,” Natalia replied, leaning down to kiss the queen’s forehead, damp with sweat and creased with worry.  “It will only be the first time, Camille.  We will practice after that, so that it does not hurt so much.”

“Practice?” the queen snorted, allowing herself to relax into the Arron girl’s arms.  “Is that all that this is, Nat?  Practice?”    

Natalia had only smiled, pulling Camille up by the shoulders until the queen was snug in her lap as a little child.  If it had all been practice, some cold plan manufactured and set into motion by Aileen, everything would be so much easier; if she was ordered simply to instruct Camille in the ways of romance, teach her how to kiss and flirt and use her body language, it would not have been so difficult to watch the queen bat her lashes and swoon into Charles Bennett at the Samhain feast; if Natalia had not allowed herself those years of foolish, youthful indulgence, this night would not hurt so much.    

Now, Natalia can only run a sharp-nailed finger along the queen’s spine and hope that it conveys the same message as the comforting words that she so desperately wishes to say.  The priestesses are watching their every move, including the red-haired girl from Rolanth Temple.  Natalia can pick her out easily in the darkness of the tent, narrowed eyes glinting dangerously from beneath a white hood.  

As the last buttons of Camille’s nightdress are fastened, Natalia clears her throat.  If the Black Council has truly subdued the Temple, then perhaps the priestesses will be obligated to grant her request.  “I would like a moment with the queen,” she says, head held high and jaw set in defiance.  “Alone.”   

“It cannot be done,” the fiery-haired priestess snaps, stepping forward as if she would like to apprehend Natalia and drag the insolent girl from the tent herself.  “On her wedding night, a queen is not to be alone with anyone besides the king-consort.”  

 “I wished only to pray for her,” Natalia gasps, doing her best to look abashed.  “But very well.”  She turns her head ever-so-slightly, stealing one more glance at Camille and disguising it as a cursory check of the queen’s hair and nightdress.  She is beautiful, of course; but her big black eyes are so very afraid.  “The queen is prepared to meet her king-consort.” 

 

In the darkness of the Breccia Domain, one dead queen says to another: “Did you ever love anyone?” 

The other queen only scoffs.  “I did not live long enough to fall in love,” she replies, although something in her voice is almost bitter.  “All that I cared about was surviving past my sixteenth birthday.”

At that, she reaches up to finger the hole in her throat--a perfectly-placed wound from a poison arrow.  She was dead within the span of a minute, before her foster parents could rush to her side and offer words of comfort or hold her pale hand.  The last thing that she ever saw was the retreating form of her hawk as it was shot out of the sky, struck down for its loyalty.  Her beloved bird had been flying frantically to seek help.  

Seeing the tortured expression that rises on her face, the other queen turns away.  

“And what about you, Mother?  Did you love your king-consort?”

“I liked him well enough,” Nicola replies, her voice far-away.  She has been brooding all night, fretting over Camille’s coronation and subsequent coupling with the mainlander.  “He was very funny.  I chose him because through all of the horror of the Ascension Year, he could always make me laugh.”

“He was funny,” another queen agrees, not bothering to disguise the anger in her voice.  “And a good liar, too.  Tell your girls the truth, Nicola.”  When the other queen will only stare, she continues.  In the shadows of the cavern, her dead eyes are shining with tears.  “That you took him from me.”

Nicola sighs, then, and relents.  “I know, Seline.  And I have apologized to you a dozen times a day since my arrival, have I not?”  She turns then to her daughter, who sits with her eyes wide, intrigued and expectant.  “My king-consort took first court with Seline.  He was impressed by how well she performed at the Quickening--a rain dance, was it not?  How you called that storm to drench us all, and nearly ruined my  _ Gave Noir _ .”

Seline’s expression softens, then, and the sound that escapes her mouth could almost be a laugh.  “Yes, my Shannon Storm,” she sighs, leaning dreamily against the rocks.  “I nearly struck him with lightning.  He would never let me forget it.”  

“Do you remember his name?” Nicola asks.  “It evades me.”

Seline’s brows knit together in concentration, but she finds that she cannot produce an answer.  “We have been down here too long, I am afraid.  The Breccia Domain has a way of devouring your best memories.”  All at once, her expression darkens.  “But it has not let me forget the day that he left for Indrid Down with all of his trunks and horses, never to return.  To have dinner with you just once, he told me--to see what all the fuss was about.”

The queen with the arrow wound through her throat interjects, “Then she killed me, and he knew what all the fuss was about.”

In the corner of the cavern, from beneath an overhang of rock, the quietest of all the dead queens speaks for the first time in days.  “I think that I was in love once,” she whispers, so low that the others must strain to hear.  “There was a priestess who guarded me--long before Beltane, and afterwards for as long as she could.  It was meant to ease my paranoia.  She made me feel safe.”

The dead queen’s sister moves towards her, meaning to put a comforting arm on the girl’s shoulder.  “Melly,” she coos, face twisted with pity even as her sister flinches away.  “Do you remember anything else?  Her name?”

“No,” Melisende rasps, her throat clogged with suppressed tears.  “But I do remember that she had them put flowers on me, and visited every day while I was in Rolanth Temple, trapped in my own body and waiting for Samhain.  She even slept on the cold stone floor.”  The queen shakes, her whole body wracked with a tortured sob.  “And when the time came, she cut out my heart as gently as she could.”

 

Sweat.  

Camille’s nostrils are filled with the stench of it, fusing her skin and Charles's together.  She wants desperately to untangle and peel apart.  

If Natalia were here--her safe, familiar, lovely Nat--the queen would be able to relax.  With Charles Bennett, she feels as if she is on display, and every action is a part of an elaborate performance.  Even with her back turned, she can feel his eyes on her, roving and ogling every inch of bare skin in a way that no islander man would ever dare to.  It burns her up.

“Was it alright?” Charles mumbles.  His breath is too hot, blowing against Camille’s sweat-damp skin with every word.  

“Lovely,” the queen replies, although there is a searing ache between her legs and a spot of blood beneath them.  “Should you not go and show your father the sheets?”  

And take your hands off of me, you great sweaty oaf, Camille thinks.  The thought comes to her in the form of Natalia’s voice.  It is exactly what she would say, were she trapped beneath the full heft of Charles Bennett.  

“I suppose I should,” Charles says, standing so abruptly that Camille does not have time to avert her eyes.  A naked man is a truly hideous thing.  “Have you seen my trousers?”        

Camille can only jerk her hand towards the corner of the tent, where he had carelessly discarded them in his excitement.  Once they were alone together, the suitor who had seemed so discerning and Arron-clever upon their first meeting had turned immediately into a rabid dog, all pawing and slobber.  

Natalia would never behave like such a savage.  Even in the most intimate of moments, she was careful and calculating, almost as if she was holding back.  It was always Camille that lost control, left marks and raised her voice.      

She had resented that, once, as a young girl desperate for every drop of passion that Natalia had to offer; but now, after a half-hour spent under the demanding touch of a mainland brute, the queen realizes that it was a gift.  Natalia’s cold, measured kisses were meant to melt under the heat of her own, creating something beautiful, something divine--no matter what Genevieve or the Temple would say.  With Charles Bennett, it was all heat and saliva, all hasty movement without passion, all sloppy and uncoordinated.    

All sweat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woohoo! Next chapter will be LONG AS HELL, which is why this one took so long. I ambitiously tried to fit Camille's coronation and sixteen year reign into one chapter. Obviously did not happen. Thanks to Sam, my loyal commenter/kudos giver! I read your comments several times as motivation to not abandon this fic. :-) Hoping that as ODT approaches this tag/fandom will grow exponentially!

**Author's Note:**

> I was fascinated by Natalia Arron's personality, and how she obviously loved Katharine even though she is supposed to be a sort of "ice queen". It was also fascinating to me how Natalia grew up with Camille, but never told Katharine anything about her beyond the stories of how she killed her sisters. And of course, the sneaky business that Camille pulled with Katharine and Arisnoe...I just can't stop theorizing long enough to wait for the sequel, so I'm creating my own as a form of catharsis. I guess I spent so much time obsessing over it that I invented my own bit of mythos. I also think everything can be improved with brilliant, scheming, politically powerful WLW, of course. ;)  
> This is the first in a series that will focus on three possible futures, with a different triplet winning in each. It is mostly canon compliant as far as the events of the first novel, but will diverge from there. This work, of course, is mostly my own imagination/prequel.


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